The present invention is directed to a medical isolation gown that is shaped and equipped with pouches, slots, convenient entry openings, closing mechanisms, additional barriers, upper and lower extremity coverings with shoe pouches in a one size fits all solution. The present invention is meant to be utilized by medical personnel or others who are attending to patients isolated due to contagious diseases. The primary object of the present invention is to provide an uninterrupted layer of isolation and improve isolation integrity, and thereby enhance the degree of protection from contamination. The present invention thus decreases the chance of contamination of the user. In addition, its user friendly shape improves worker compliance with isolation regulations.
The present invention protects not only the worker but also an instrument/tool used by the worker from contamination. Thus, the worker's safety in using the tool is improved since the tool is not contaminated. It eliminates the risk of cross-contamination or contamination between workers by eliminating the need to use shared instruments, as well as a risk of self-contamination while using unprotected and contaminated instruments.
In a hospital setting, a patient with an infectious disease is generally isolated in a room, which is considered contaminated. The hospital generally dedicates one, poor quality stethoscope, for that patient room, to be used by all healthcare personnel who may attend or treat the patient. Naturally as it is used, the stethoscope becomes contaminated by contact with the patient as well as by manipulation of healthcare persons who touch the stethoscope with already contaminated gloves. The healthcare professionals, by standard procedures of examining the patient, are forced to touch and use the same shared and contaminated stethoscope again and again. The same contaminated stethoscope is placed on the face and into the ears of the next doctor/nurse in the room examining the patient. This creates a hazard of contaminating a healthcare worker's face or ears by use of the contaminated stethoscope, which is already contaminated with the patient's or other healthcare worker's pathogens.
The present invention seeks to eliminate or reduce the risk of contamination, by eliminating the need for the use of contaminated tools by the healthcare worker, as well as providing a full and continuous layer of contact isolation. Another object of the present invention is to reduce the risk of patient as well as healthcare worker contamination with pathogens from another patient, or from another healthcare worker.
Another object of the present invention is to improve the quality of care by reducing the chance of a patient dying and/or suffering due to hospital-acquired infection. In addition, the present invention may lower healthcare costs by further reducing the risk of contamination, and the costs associated with the treatment of hospital acquired infections as well as eliminating the costly need for disposable/shared instruments which normally are dedicated to the contaminated patient area and later disposed of.
Another object of the present invention is to improve healthcare worker compliance with isolation guidelines by creating a user friendly isolation gown. The present invention is user friendly because it allows the worker, by putting the “one piece” isolation gown on, to achieve all steps necessary before entering the isolation room. In addition, it allows the workers to use their own dedicated medical instruments rather than shared instruments.
Another object of the present invention is to improve the quality of patient care by improving the healthcare workers attendance to persons in isolation by reducing the incidence of doctors avoiding the examination of isolated patients due to inconvenience and excessive time consumption of examination in an isolation room. This is achieved by user-friendly construction of the gown as well as allowing the worker to use better quality, personal instruments. e.g. stethoscopes. These are generally better tools, more likely to be used by healthcare workers than those found in contaminated rooms and can produce a more accurate diagnosis.